Are you interested in open source at VMware, software development kits (SDKs), vSphere PowerCLI or vSphere APIs? Come join Alan Renouf and his colleagues at these top VMworld open source sessions in the U.S. and Europe to learn more from the experts!

Alan Renouf is a Senior Product Line Manager at VMware focusing on APIs, SDKs, and CLIs. He is responsible for providing the architects and operators of private and public cloud infrastructure with the tool kits, frameworks and command-line interfaces they require to build a fully automated software-defined data center.

Here are Alan’s top VMworld open source sessions on APIs, SDKs & CLIs:

1. VMware & Chef: Leveraging the vSphere API Together

In this session, you will get an overview of the current VMware vSphere API and how to use it in your own data center. We will explore some of the different methods and tools available to a variety of audiences (vSphere administrators, developers, security admins, auditors) when automating against the vSphere API.

Leveraging the new vSphere representational state transfer (REST) API, we will show how to use the new Chef integration to build a virtual machine using a DevOps workflow.

Before that, though, we will start with a basic overview of Chef, going into the knife-vcenter plug-in, comparing it to the legacy knife-vsphere, and introducing a new test-kitchen integration. We will also touch on the InSpec framework to show the basic integration testing to confirm the virtual machine is in the desired state.

4. Simplifying & Accelerating Your Multi-Cloud Strategy

Join Alan, who will be presenting a must-see demo in this session with some of the key VMware employees.

The need to integrate multiple clouds is the new normal. We are living in a multi-cloud world and your cloud strategy should enable you to choose the right clouds for the right workloads at the right time. In this session, we’ll showcase how VMware’s rapidly expanding Cloud Services portfolio is helping customers optimize their cloud strategy by matching application requirements to the right cloud destinations—based on needs for cost savings, application agility, and timescales.

A brief introduction to the VMware vSphere software development kits (SDKs);

The history of when VMware first introduced programmatic interfaces; and

The recent fantastic enhancements made in this space.

You will learn how to:

Start with nothing;

Gain access to the vSphere automation SDKs;

Prototype simple API calls; and

Work with the SDKs and other free tools to produce your own simple web-based application.

We will also show how to further this project by using the other VMware open-source project, Clarity, all in one hour! This session is a must for vSphere admins, developers and DevOps teams looking to integrate with vSphere and further their education on the vSphere APIs, SDKs and CLIs.

6. The Power Hour: vSphere PowerCLI 10th Birthday Edition

In this special edition of the Power Hour, marking the 10th birthday of VMware vSphere PowerCLI, Alan and Luc will not only bring you new features and deep dives, but also show how far vSphere PowerCLI has come and how it has evolved over the past 10 years.

The deep dives will extend far beyond vSphere administration. Since vSphere PowerCLI, PowerShell and your learning have changed over the years, we will revisit some of the more memorable scripts that vSphere PowerCLI has spawned and see how they can be given a modern look.

The examples will demonstrate how to manage your VMware products with vSphere PowerCLI in a consistent and user-friendly way. This trip along memory lane from early beginnings to the current rich feature set will show you again why vSphere PowerCLI should be your preferred management and automation tool.

7. vSphere PowerCLI What’s New: The Next Evolutionary Leap Is Now

Get the latest scoop on PowerCLI Features and Capabilities with Alan and Jake! Acquiring the latest version of PowerCLI has never been easier! Learn about the latest improvements of PowerCLI Installation and Upgrade using the Powershell Gallery. We’re always adding new cmdlets to PowerCLI, and the latest release does not disappoint.

We’ll share the breadth of everything new you can do with PowerCLI including added vCenter functionality, VSAN functionality and even how these cmdlets can be used against Vmware Cloud on AWS. If all this wasn’t enough, we’ll also give an overview of multi-platform support and a technical preview of upcoming features. If you’re just getting started in PowerCLI or have already made a significant investment, you’ll want to be here!

Learn about the VMware Cloud for AWS API and how we can enable your automation goals through our representational state transfer (RESTful) API, along with our CLI and PowerShell integrations. This session will focus on automation and include demonstrations and code samples.

There are many interesting technical breakout sessions and other discussions on virtualizing big data being given at the VMworld events this year. To give you a time-ordered roadmap to all of these sessions, here is the list we have built along with their times and dates of delivery. Check in at the event itself for the rooms in which these will be held We will look forward to seeing you there!

A team from VMware’s Office of the CTO shows their work in providing a “spreadsheet for big data” that gives convenience at scale, contrasting with the infrastructures that many companies look to first

This talk looks into the viability of using different file systems to the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) and explores a set of alternative storage mechanisms for that data. These are becoming more common as big data matures on virtualization technology.

In this Office of the CTO (VMware) session, the speakers will share details of work they have done in three extremely performance-critical situations. They will talk about tuning and configuring VMWare ESXi to run a very latency-sensitive financial application, for example.

As Graphical Processing Units spread further inside the data center, this talk examines their use for virtualizing workloads other than VDI, such as for big data and analytics – and shows how best to make your decisions about using the technologies together.

Using vSphere 6.5 and the latest Intel hardware, VMware’s performance engineering lead on big data shows further evidence of the high performance and flexibility you can achieve by virtualizing your big data deployments. This is always a very popular talk at VMworld, so come early!

This talk looks into the viability of using different file systems to the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) and explores a set of alternative storage mechanisms for that data. These are becoming more common as big data matures on virtualization technology.

[MMC3164BE] How Data Science is Transforming Operations: Introduction to Wavefront by VMware: 2:00-3:00pm

Companies are re-thinking how they monitor and manage their systems, The data science techniques that WaveFront customers like Box, Lyft, Workday and Groupon use will be explored in this talk.

Using vSphere 6.5 and the latest Intel hardware, VMware’s performance engineering lead on big data shows further evidence of the high performance and flexibility you can achieve by virtualizing your big data deployments. This is always a very popular talk at VMworld, so do sign up early for it!

In this Office of the CTO (VMware) session, the speakers will share details of work they have done in three extremely performance-critical situations. They will talk about tuning and configuring VMWare ESXi to run a very latency-sensitive financial application, for example.

As its motto says, the Hillview open source project is “big data for the 99% of enterprises.” And with the torrential influx of “things” entering businesses and homes everywhere, toolsets for big data exploration are in high demand. Fortunately for your IT and operations teams, Hillview can handle datasets with a billion rows—interactively.

“Hillview is still an early prototype, but we are excited by its capabilities. We decided to keep this as an open-source project, to make it readily accessible to the maximum number of users and contributors.”

Today we are releasing a new set of Light Board videos in the vSphere 6.5 playlist, all dedicated to helping customers with vCenter Server 6.5 architecture and design. These videos are a bit different from the previous ones we did, since Adam and I decided to have a more conversational approach. We took a lot of the common questions that we get from customers about vCenter Server deployment, architecture, and high availability and the result is these three interactive and easy to follow along videos. Another difference with these videos is now we included the links to any content we are referencing making it very easy to access.

Deployment

This video covers vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller 6.5 deployment types. Here we address common questions such as when should embedded or external deployments be used. We also debunked some misconceptions about the embedded deployment type and enhanced linked mode.

Architecture

vCenter Server architecture is a discussion we have on a daily basis with customers. Understanding the basics is key to having successful vCenter Server deployment. In this video we have a deep dive discussion on the vSphere Sign Sign-On domain components and what role they play. We also cover terminology, decommission, and backup of these components.

Availability

Finally, now that we have our deployment in place it’s time to ensure we’ve met our SLAs and provided the right availability solution for vCenter Server. In this video we discuss high availability for the Platform Services Controller which includes how the load balancer works for this solution. Then we go into native vCenter Server high availability (VCHA) and how it can be used to protect vCenter Server when embedded and external.

We hope that these videos help guide you to a successful deployment and answer a lot of your questions around vCenter Server 6.5 and vSphere Single Sign-On Domains. Please feel free to reach out to us on social media @emad_younis or @eck79 or in the comments sections below. Happy deployment.

This program is VMware’s global evangelist and advocacy program. It is designed to recognize the incredible work and dedication of VMware customers, partners, and employees who tirelessly share their virtualization knowledge with each other via communities, blog posts, videos, podcasts, events, slack channels, etc.

Y’all work hard, and we really appreciate it. This year, to show our appreciation, we have swag bags for each and every vExpert, courtesy of the vSphere team. But we need your help to deliver these bags to you. Here’s what you need to do:

451Research recently estimated that around 30 percent of technology companies use PostgreSQL for core applications. This object-relational, open source database system for enterprises is known for its power, reliability and scalability. VMware engineers Peter Geoghegan, Kevin Grittner and Michael Paquier are some of the bright minds behind the growing success of PostgreSQL.

These three members of VMware’s PostgreSQL engineering team have a storied history with the project. Peter contributed sorting improvements, group commits and the UPSERT patch, which allows someone to automatically insert a row or update an existing one. Kevin added materialized views to PostgreSQL and works on contributions around SSI. Michael works on commitfest management, code reviews and bug fixes.

As Peter notes, “the popularity of PostgreSQL is generally considered to be on the up-and-up.” Users hail from a variety of industries and government agencies, which use PostgreSQL when high-volumes of data need to be quickly sorted into custom formats. Currently Peter is continuing his work with corruption detection in PostgreSQL and is researching index bloat and potential solutions. His most recent contribution was a code commit for amcheck.

Peter, Kevin and Michael have been active observers and contributors of PostgreSQL for years. Beginning as an academic project at UC Berkeley in the 1980s, PostgreSQL is now more popular than at any other point in its history. The PostgreSQL experts said a big part of that longevity is due to the tireless collaboration and trust within the open source community.

“This is almost like a lifestyle choice at this point, honestly. That’s really not an exaggeration,” Peter said, talking about his years of experience working on open source projects. If not for its open source contributors, Kevin says PostgreSQL would not be where it is today. “One of the advantages of open source is that if you need something and it’s not there, you can make it happen.”

Make it happen they did—over a lengthy period of time, that is. The prevailing joke is that PostgreSQL is an overnight success 30 years in the making. However, Peter, Kevin and Michael believe success was fueled by a slow-growing awareness leading to a recent surge in popularity.

PostgreSQL is based on well-established ideas when it comes to a database system. As an open source project, this familiar foundation is much easier for contributors to navigate. PostgreSQL was also consciously developed to make all enhancements more seamless than traditional methods of development. This enables different people with different needs to utilize PostgreSQL.

For example, a set of Russian scientists needed a new index for their astronomy work with complicated inputs documenting work in multiple dimensions. They were able to write their own code and plug it into PostgreSQL because of the project’s sound framework. They contributed their indexing code to the open source community, and now others are using it for more terrestrial purposes, like running a search for the closest pizza restaurants near someone.

Many of PostgreSQL’s features carved out a path for its success, but picking a favorite is a difficult task for the team. Peter likens this to picking the favorite feature of your car; how can you possibly choose? However, Michael is fond of one of PostgreSQL’s newest offerings. “I like a lot of the work that’s been put into a new feature called SCRAM (Salted Challenge Response Authentication Method), which is the new authentication protocol,” he said. He’s one of the authors of the feature, which has been in development for four years.

Another reason for PostgreSQL’s success lies in the collaborative, dedicated and professional open source community. Peter, Kevin and Michael are quick to praise the community. For Michael, PostgreSQL was his first foray into the open source world. “[It] got me introduced to the basics of the community and the basic way of doing things.” Michael now ranks third among contributors of patches (or fixes) for the program.

Peter and Kevin, meanwhile, are veterans of the open source community. Peter believes the community is driven by a long-term outlook on advancing the project. Kevin is quick to point out the camaraderie in the community and around PostgreSQL. In fact, many of the features added to PostgreSQL came from contributors sharing beers during industry conferences.

The excitement around this project has lured many more collaborators, with approximately 200 developers currently working on PostgreSQL. The recent growth in adoption of the database is inspiring even more developers to join the community. The community is so involved, in fact, that an emerging problem is accommodating the growing number of patches people want to contribute.

Given this influx, sufficiently reviewing the volume of contributions is becoming a challenge. But when it comes to open source projects like PostgreSQL, a surplus of inspired participation is not a bad problem to have.

As part of the introduction of vSphere Central, one of the brand new assets we’ve put together is the vSphere 6.5 Topology and Upgrade Planning Tool. This tool aims to help customers plan and execute both upgrades to vSphere 6.5 as well as new deployments. With this initial release, the tool is focused on the most common upgrade paths and deployments of vCenter Server 6.5. Updates to the content within the tool are planned to occur over time. And, depending on feedback and value the tool has for customers, there could be other products or features added in with the aim of providing an even more complete set of assets for a given scenario. The sky’s the limit!

This tool works by asking a series of questions while providing some guidance along the way to help answer those questions eventually making some recommendations on topology and upgrade and deployment steps. This may sound somewhat familiar. This tool was inspired by the Platform Services Controller Topology Decision Tree and is really an extension of it. The questions and content are focused specifically on the vCenter Server Appliance 6.5 since that is the recommended vCenter Server deployment type. Once all of the questions in a given branch are answered, you are presented with some details steps along with a diagram specific to that path you chose. There are also three groups of assets that include blogs, product documentation, KBs articles, and white papers. We plan to add videos and other content as new assets are created. This aligns with the overall theme of vSphere Central in that it is really important to us that the content is curated. Each asset serves a purpose and is typically a frequently requested item that will be instrumental in the success of your upgrade or deployment.

Another nice thing about the vSphere 6.5 Topology and Upgrade Planning Tool is that the collection of assets at the end can be easily emailed to yourself, a colleague, or even a group of people. There are also some basic navigational buttons and a universal search bar at the top. Below is a screenshot that shows these elements in the UI.

I want to make a few things clear about this tool. As I previously mentioned this tool will evolve over time. Not only will the content be updated but the platform on which the tool is built will also see improvements. We’re planning the addition of a built-in feedback tool, some structural changes to make sharing specific steps within the tool easier, and continuously improve the overall UX. For now feel free to leave a comment on this blog post, reach me on twitter via @eck79, or the various other social channels you may find this post. You’re feedback is vital to this tool continuing to improve so it is greatly appreciated!

The vSphere 6.5 Topology and Upgrade Planning Tool can be found here as well as in vSphere Central.

I am pleased to announce the release of a brand new technical resource center called vSphere Central. This site brings together a variety of technical assets from VMware that helps users understand how vSphere works, how to implement various features, plan upgrades, and more. With content in a range of formats, including text, video, and rich media tools such as walkthrough demos, the goal is to be a one-stop shop for original and curated technical content on vSphere.

With the release of vSphere 6.5U1, we are proud to announce the second update to the vSphere Client!

Just like last time, with vSphere 6.5.0b, those that have been using our Flings will not be surprised by the list of functionality updates for the vSphere Client. Now for well over a year a year we’ve been releasing updates to the vSphere HTML5 Web Client Fling on a (roughly) weekly basis, adding support for features, new user experiences, and more. As these changes have matured due to the excellent feedback we’ve received from the Fling’s users, we’re able to make further improvements and incorporate those into the vSphere Client included with 6.5.U1.

This is the list of some of the additional functionality included. Same as last time, some of these features are presented in a partially complete manner (such as SPBM). The plan is to fill out all features, but the more feedback we get from you regarding what is most important will help us deliver faster.

DRS/HA VM overrides

SDRS rules

Content Library – further actions

Roles and Global Permissions

Download multiple files as zip

Distributed Switch – further actions

Fault Tolerance

SPBM

VM Hardware – further items

Apply Customize Guest OS during Clone

VM Migration – further actions (compute+storage, Cross VC, batch)

Some of these flows may have had minor tweaks to make them easier to use and learn. If you have feedback about any of the new behavior, or missing portions of features, of course let us know using the integrated feedback tool by clicking on the smiley face in the upper righthand corner.

Calling for volunteers!

We would like to connect with users one-on-one to understand how much you’re using the vSphere Client either via vSphere HTML5 Web Client Fling or the vSphere Client (HTML5) bundled in 6.5 (6.5 GA, 6.5.0b and now 6.5U1). If you’re interested, please fill out this form:

Still need your feedback!

With this release, we believe we can cover almost all of your regular operations. It is vitally important that we get your feedback on this release on what the remaining high-priority gaps are so that we can get them into the next quarterly release. In particular, letting us know specific times when you find yourself jumping from the vSphere Client back to the vSphere Web Client would be extra helpful. Provide feedback through the above link, on the Flings page, or comments below. We have a new hashtag too! Please use #vsphereclient wherever you have feedback.